Ear Chewing?

[piglet_and_rogers_mama]

Every time the pigs have floor time (we divide it between piglet and roger or roger and george since piglet and george don't play nice) roger always ends up chewing, or maybe licking the others' ears...which they seem to like bc their eyes close and they let him do it. What exactly are they doing, is it grooming? It's just on the ears! Anyone else have pigs who do this, or is Poge just a little weirdo?

 

[scpiggy]

That sounds like power grooming it's a friendly way of showing dominance. Not an uncommon thing.

 

[VickiA]

As @scpiggy has said it is probably just Roger showing his dominance over the others. One of my girls always did this as a gentle reminder to her cage mates. As long as there is no proper biting of bleeding it is ok.

 

[gizzy]

Hi there , Poge isn't a weirdo , several of my pigs do this , one sow Adreanoch, use to nip her Partners ear for the specific reason of drawing blood!

Old Toby R.I.P , used to hate the nip but he tolerated it, as his reward was A prolonged Ear Lick Which he adored!

I had to put a stop to it so I rubbed t tree cream on his ears, his sow would not go near his ear,s after that

 

[piglet_and_rogers_mama]

There is never any drawing of blood or noises that indicate pain, so that's good at least. It kinda seems like they like it!

 

[Sarah from Chucklebunnies]

If you clean your piggy's ears out yourself with a damp finger (as their mum's would have done) and then rub their bottoms (as their mum's would have licked them to encourage pooing properly) then you become the dominant partner and they are less likely to be stressed. Ears are very important to piggies. I do not recommend licking your finger while cleaning out their ears yourself , but it does work. I did this to a piggy at Sue's (Doncaster rescue Cavy Corner) and realised the room had gone silent and they were all watching me as the piggy gave that lovely rich low happy endless chuckle for me. Sue was pleased with me so it must have been ok.

On the other hand my Mina is an ear biter, she is a runt and was bullied when small (not by my herd I hasten to add). Now she needs to attempt to assert dominance by nibbling the right ear, it is only ever the right ear and it always happens at night when I think she is less happy. The sow in charge overall has never had her ear nipped and never will. All the others are missing bits on the right ear now. I cannot change Mina, she is the way she is because of her start in life, all I can do is keep an eye on the others and use salty water to help avoid infection when she does take another small chunk out of somebody's ear.

Ear washing is good herd behaviour, nice to see. It also reaffirms bonds when they snuggle into the bald patch behind the ear, that will be a less dominant one wanting reassurance from a more dominant one. Never underestimate the importance of ears!